Why do women have sex?

Perusing Salon.com, I stumbled upon another article about the newly released book which spends indeed the entirety of the book answering the question: "why do women have sex?". I ran through a few of the questions in a interview with the author, of which one interested me particularly because, well, we all ask this question at some point in our lives, if not only once:

" How do we explain the stud-slut double standard? What kind of evolutionary basis is behind that?

Buss: The short-term, long-term distinction is critical. All I can offer is a speculation: One of the key adaptive problems that men have to solve in picking a long-term mate is assuring that they’re the father. It's the paternity certainty problem. This stems from the fact of our reproductive biology. Fertilization occurs internally in women and not men. Maternity is always 100 percent certain, and paternity is always less than 100 percent certain. Men look for cues to sexual fidelity with long-term mates.

The number of premarital sex partners is a good predictor of infidelity post-marriage. That applies for both men and women. The higher the number before marriage, the higher the probability that there’s going to be an infidelity in the marriage. Ultimately, I think that’s part of the reason for that double standard."



Interesting answer, one I could've never fathomed, but very intuitive nonetheless.

- Kenneth